Abstract:
In the hushed alleys of Indian villages and the rhythmic chants of tribal heartlands, folklore lives, not in archives, but in memory, melody, and movement. As folklore lives and breathes across generations, shaped not by ink but by memory, it finds itself estranged in the world of modern legal systems that demand fixation, authorship, and originality. What cannot be copyrighted is cast into silence. What belongs to all is claimed by few. This is the crisis that breathes life into this inquiry: the dissonance between a living tradition and a rigid legal regime. The chapter pays particular attention to folklore, a category of traditional knowledge that resists neat classification within existing legal doctrines yet remains integral to cultural identity and intergenerational justice. The study critically engages with Indian intellectual property law, as well as relevant international legal instruments, to investigate the scope and limitations of current frameworks in protecting folklore. Unlike conventional forms of intellectual property, folklore is collective, orally transmitted, and constantly evolving—rendering it vulnerable under legal systems designed to privilege individual authorship, originality, and fixation. By examining how folklore sits uncomfortably within such doctrinal constraints, the chapter foregrounds the urgent need for a legal model that can account for its unique character and communal ownership.To that end, the research adopts an interdisciplinary doctrinal methodology, incorporating analysis of statutes, treaties, and case law, while also drawing upon anthropological and philosophical insights into the socio-legal nature of traditional knowledge systems. The study further evaluates the findings of the 161st Parliamentary Standing Committee Report, which lays bare the institutional and definitional voids that currently plague the protection of traditional and indigenous knowledge in India. Recognizing that conventional intellectual property frameworks fail to address the lived realities and cultural contexts of folklore, the study undertakes a comparative exploration of sui generis legislative models adopted in jurisdictions such as Kenya and Panama. The implications of this study are both juridical and societal. Ultimately, this chapter affirms that protecting folklore is not an academic indulgence, it is a moral and constitutional imperative in a plural, postcolonial democracy still learning to listen to its oldest songs.
